Escape Read online

  Escape

  Rise of the Black Dragon, Book 1

  Jada Fisher

  Copyright © 2019 Fairfield Publishing

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Except for review quotes, this book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without the written consent of the author.

  This story is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual people, places, or events is purely coincidental.

  Contents

  1. No Home for Their Kind

  2. Unbalanced Scales

  3. Fleeing the Dead

  4. Help Comes in Many Strange Forms

  5. Lower than Scum

  6. Know Thy Enemy

  7. It Takes a Village

  8. For a Price

  9. Acclimation

  10. Unlikely Allies

  11. Last Resort

  12. Twice is a Pattern

  13. The Last of the Journey

  14. Rothaiche M’or

  Epilogue

  Thank You

  1

  No Home for Their Kind

  Wind whipped through her hair, hot and dry and thin, but wonderful all the same. The sun beat down on her skin, almost too hot to be comfortable, but the speed at which she moved wicked away any discomfort before it could settle in.

  Where was she?

  It didn’t matter.

  The only thing that mattered was the feeling that bloomed in her middle as she spread her arms, the wind catching them and pushing them backward. She laughed, a sound she hadn’t made much since her mother had…since her mother had gone. The young woman could almost hear her mother’s voice chiding her.

  “Ukrah! When I told you that your head was too often in the clouds, I did not mean it literally!”

  But…how exactly was she flying?

  That thread of logic ruined the carefree, unchained feeling within the young woman and she finally looked down. She expected to see only miles and miles of wasteland stretching out under her. Maybe the sands of her home, or the stinking greens of the marshes. Or maybe even the sun-bleached, ultra-sharp rocks of the bladed mountains.

  But none of those were what was waiting for her at all.

  The ground below was green, but not in that same cloying, rotting way of the marshes in the eastern wilds, a land mostly untouched except for those that sank into the muck and died there. No, it was vibrant, and lush, with thousands of little reed-like plants that rippled in the wind. It was beautiful, for all it was impossible, and she could almost smell the things as the air suddenly changed temperature.

  Cool. Almost cold. And there was so much water! In the desert, where her tribe lived, everything was always arid and baked by the sun. But it wasn’t like that here…wherever she was now.

  But even the amazing greens and the cool, damp air weren’t enough to keep her attention away from the…the…beast below her.

  It was truly a massive thing, longer than the length of their largest community tent, longer than some caravans. She sat astride it, her tanned thighs on either side of what looked to be a very expensive, well-made saddle. Its scales glittered in the sun, and it didn’t have to raise its head for her to know exactly what it was.

  A dragon.

  She was riding a dragon!

  A gasp escaped her lips, then a loud, long laugh. Everyone knew dragons were only for the people of the settled lands, the kingdoms of man and law who dared not enter the wilds where her people lived beyond the cracked mountains.

  Occasionally a dragon would fly over the wilds, which had once crawled with every wicked creature of nightmare, with beasts and blights and oh-so-dangerous things, but then all of that evil suddenly vanished five years earlier.

  That had been quite the shock.

  Her entire early life had been spent living in caves with fiercely guarded entrances, only going out during the brightest time of day to scavenge and harvest with her mother and other women of the tribe. To fetch water and fire kindling and anything else they might need while the men and women without children hunted. It was dangerous to be out in the open, undefended aside from a spear and slingshot. Ukrah knew that from firsthand experience.

  The dragon dove down, down, down, through the trees and then the earth itself until they burst into a beautiful, glowing web of gold as far as her eyes could see. It was breathtaking, with thousands upon thousands of glistening gossamer threads shimmering with a power that she could feel all the way down her spine.

  She didn’t know why really, but she reached for it, her dry, cracked nails wanting nothing more than to caress one of those golden strings. Surely, she deserved just…a little…touch…

  But before her finger could so much as brush against it, the gold winked out at once and she was yanked back, right through the entire world around her.

  Hands gripped her, yanking her hard across the hide floor of the tent she shared with Mahara and Chava, other orphans who had lost their parents before the great renewal five years earlier. She went for the knife she always kept under her pillow, but she was already too far from her roll.

  She was yanked up and out, thrust from her tent only to end up in more hands. Something was put over her head, rough and dark, and then she could see nothing at all.

  What was happening? Raiders? Slavers from the settled lands? She didn’t know, she couldn’t see, could hardly hear over the rush in her ears.

  “Let me go!” she screamed, kicking this way and that. “Let me go now, and I’ll let you live!”

  It sounded like an empty threat from a girl of fourteen suns, but Ukrah knew just enough of fighting and protecting herself to be a nuisance. She had to, after watching her mother die to protect her. She swore she would never be so weak again as to cause someone else harm because of her ineptitude.

  She wrestled a hand free from whoever was holding it and lashed out, her fist curled tightly. She struck something and heard a crack, and then cursing. For a moment, she allowed herself to feel the faintest bit of satisfaction, but then she recognized the voice behind the epithets.

  “Hahram?” she asked, going still for the briefest of moments.

  “Quiet, child!” someone else hissed, clapping something around her wrist.

  But Ukrah knew that voice too. “Muriella? What’s going on? Why are you doing this!?” Was it some sort of prank? If so, Ukrah did not enjoy it in the slightest. Sure, it was custom for the sisters of a bride to come kidnap her for dancing and fun the night before her wedding, and the same with brothers of the groom, but Ukrah was just fourteen and all sturdy limbs. While the older women assured her that she would gain the curves that seemed to go hand in hand with femininity, Ukrah was built more like a solid slab of stone.

  No, definitely not a wedding night celebration.

  So then what?

  Suddenly, she was hoisted over a broad shoulder and carried across the camp. Ukrah thrashed, thousands of thoughts going through her mind, but none of them made sense. Why were her hands bound? Why had people come into her tent? Why were they people she knew?!

  “What are you doing?” she cried again. “What is happening? This is not funny!”

  She was abruptly set down, but before she could recover her balance, she was pushed firmly up against something hard. She tried to step away from it, to hurl herself at whoever was holding her shoulders in place, but rope was pressed against her middle then drawn up tightly, winding around and around her until she was securely bound.

  The panic was almost overwhelming within her now, bubbling up hot and bitter on the back of her tongue. Was this some sort of test? A test that she was failing? She didn’t know. She couldn’t tell. She just wanted… She just wanted to be back in her bed and safe.

  “Please,” she whispered into the canvas sack over her head. “Tell me what’s going on.”

  Someone
must have had pity on her, because the cloth was suddenly yanked off, leaving her blinking at the crowd in front of her.

  Perhaps it would have taken longer for her eyes to adjust if it was daytime, when the sun was bright and unforgiving, but since it was the deep of night, it only took a breath or two for her vision to adjust to the torches illuminating the figures in front of her.

  And what she saw made her heart burn in a way that she hadn’t known was possible.

  There was the Great Mother Vyana, the spiritual leader of their tribe who advised their chief on everything from war to the growing threat of the corrupted. She stood there, dressed in her ceremonial robes, staring Ukrah down with an unreadable expression.

  Beside her was Chief Salimar, and his two sons. Beside them was their medicine woman and her family. Beyond them were most of the hunters, the gatherers, and even one of her fellow orphans. All holding torches. All just…watching.

  “What is this?” Ukrah cried. “Let me go!”

  Now that she could see, her situation wasn’t improving in the slightest. She was indeed tied to something—the tall, slender sun rock that was buried at the center of their camp and had been there since they’d first arrived at that spot a half-year earlier. A few folks were dropping brambles and bits of brush around her feet, growing closer, but not close enough for her to kick at them.

  “I am sorry, my child, but you must be cleansed from this world.”

  “C-c-cleansed?” she sputtered incredulously. “But I’m not— I… I’m not corrupted!”

  Ever since the great renewal five years earlier—the same one that had stricken down all the monsters that had roamed the wilds, that had turned water to waste and left herds of prey as little more than ash and bones—strange abilities had begun to manifest in people all over. Abilities that went against the natural order of things. And all of them were different. Some screamed of terrible dreams, visions of things they could not know. Some summoned lightning right to the ground. It was said some could even raise the dead or move across the land with just a thought.

  These powers, these aberrations, were dangerous. Corruptions of the only recently restored balance. In her tribe, there was an elite group of hunters who’s only mission was to find these infected souls and return their powers to the ground, where it belonged.

  “You have been seen, my child. Two days ago, after the rains. You pulled Nyssa from the ravine before a mudslide could claim her.”

  What!? That was all that they needed to burn her? That was impossible! “I was standing on top of a crest! I saw it coming before her!”

  “This summer, you have found us fresh water supplies four times.”

  “I find the little lizards before dawn and I follow them until they show me something!”

  No, this couldn’t be happening. A quarter of her tribe couldn’t be gathered in front of her, watching, waiting to execute her like some sort of magical curse. These were people she knew. People she cared for. People who had helped make sure she survived after her mother had…

  After her mother had been killed protecting her.

  “Your eyes have changed, little halu. You know it not, but a great evil has taken root in you. We must free you of it, so your soul may return to us, uncorrupted.”

  “No!” she screamed, bile raising in her throat. She was only fourteen. Hardly a woman. She had so much left to do! “N-n-no, they haven’t! I’m not corrupted! I’m one of you!”

  Slowly, Great Mother Vyana stepped forward, right to the edge of the circle of brambles at Ukrah’s feet. With a sudden flick of her hand, she had a large dagger unsheathed.

  Ukrah let out a cry, wincing back, but no cut came. When she opened her eyes again, the woman was holding the blade flat in front of Ukrah’s face, still and steady.

  She didn’t understand what the Great Mother wanted for a moment until she caught her reflection. Sure enough, instead of her deep, midnight eyes that had always looked so much like her mother’s, a mismatched gaze stood in its place.

  One orb was now a pitch black, pupil blown so wide that there was no telling the difference between that and the rest of it. The other… The other was a brilliant blue, brighter than the sky, with little streaks of darker cerulean through it.

  No.

  No, that wasn’t possible.

  “T-that can’t be,” she gasped, writhing against her hold. “Someone must have put a curse on me. Someone is playing a terrible trick!”

  “I am sorry, my sweet. I know this is not your fault. But I will return you to your mother’s embrace safely.”

  The old woman reached out, her fingers almost caressing Ukrah’s cheek but pulling back at the last moment. With a grave nod, she stepped back, and others moved around her to place heavy stones against Ukrah’s legs.

  They didn’t want her to be able to kick away the burning embers. To fight.

  It was said that in the settled lands, they had tall, tall plants made of wood that they cut down every day for pyres and houses, but in the sands, all they had were palms and brush and small kindling. Wood was precious, and yet they were going to use so much to kill her.

  “Stop!” she ordered, trying to catch the eyes of those who came up to her. “You know me! You can’t kill me! I’m your friend!”

  But they all ignored her as they covered her to her knees with rocks so heavy, she had no hope of movement. Tears streamed down Ukrah’s face, coupled with the angry cracking of her voice. This had to be a nightmare. It couldn’t be real. The people she had grown up with, survived with, couldn’t watch her die in such a torturous way.

  And yet they began to pile up bits of wood around her, dried palm leaves and husks from the trunks. They piled it higher and higher, until even the rocks were covered.

  The Great Mother lifted her hands to the night sky, tilting her head back as she spoke.

  “Great spirits of our world, who have been forgotten for far too long, we give you back that which has been stolen from you! We return your power to your bosom so that you may protect us again!”

  At her last word, two men with torches stepped forward, touching them to multiple spots at the edge of the pile. The flames licked up within seconds, and Ukrah could feel the heat immediately.

  “No! You can’t do this! You can’t!!”

  But their eyes just kept staring, no one moving as the heat quickly became unbearable.

  Ukrah screamed. She fought against her bonds and spat and cried and did anything that she could think of. But none of them moved. They just watched her, always staring.

  It didn’t take long for the smoke to get inside of her lungs, to make her throat raw and her voice dwindle to nothing. Her head quickly began to grow heavy, and her eyes fluttered with their weight.

  So this was how it ended. She never would have dreamed as much. She hadn’t had many dreams about the future, or what she would grow to be, but she had assumed that she would be alive.

  Her head fell back, thunking against the hard stone, but the pain didn’t register over the scalding at her legs. Instead, she just looked up at the night sky, illuminated in a sort of velvet purple by the very thing that was killing her.

  Would the others in the village wonder what happened to her? Or did they already know what was happening and had chosen to stay wrapped in their beds instead? Would anyone mourn her? Or would they just be grateful that another corrupted was gone?

  The thought made her sob again, and she wished she could wipe her face clean of the soot and tears, but her hands were bound firmly at her waist. She was trapped, and the world was fading out around her in a maelstrom of pain.

  Oh, come now. You didn’t seem like the type to give up.

  A voice. Honeyed and musical and seemingly amused. Ukrah’s eyes flicked open and she glanced around to see who was having mercy on her. Who was addressing her as an actual human, and not some monster.

  But no one’s mouth was moving in front of her. They were all still staring. Impassive as she died. As she burned.
>
  Are you just going to stand there and let them kill you? Seems like a terrible way to go.

  She was going mad, she had to be. In her final moments, her mind was seeking out some sort of comfort. But still, even though she knew it was no one, her eyes searched everywhere.

  And it was atop the nearest tent that she saw it, a little desert finch with a bib of gold and blue feathers. An unusual coloring, that was for certain, and it was even more unusual that the small bird was out at night. They were strictly sun-fliers, and rarely ever stayed out past twilight.

  Also, it was shimmering a slight gold glow, barely noticeable at this distance.

  I see you spotted me. So you’re not totally hopeless.

  “Please,” Ukrah rasped with the last of the air she had in her. “Please save me.”

  Save you? I don’t need to save you.

  “Please…”

  Can’t you tell, little halu? You don’t need anyone to save you. All you have to do is decide you want to rescue yourself.

  That didn’t make sense. None of it made sense. She was hurting and she couldn’t breathe, her feet felt like they were bubbling and blistering and so were her lungs. She just wanted to get away. To be free. But she was tied so tightly.

  “I can’t!” she wept. “I can’t… I can’t!”

  Yes, you can. Can’t you feel it, bundled up inside of you? These are people who are supposed to love you, take care of you, but they’re hurting you. That’s not right, is it?

  “No! It’s not!”

  It’s murder, plain and simple. It’s wrong. Don’t you want to right that wrong, Ukrah? Don’t you want to punish them?

  “Yes…”

  Then do it! Reach down inside of yourself and set this right! Save yourself, as only you can!